Artificial intelligence is entering international logistics through a small number of practical tasks: reading documents, predicting arrival times and congestion, forecasting demand, answering routine questions and spotting exceptions. The useful question for an importer is not whether a provider uses AI but where it is used, how its output is checked and who is responsible when it is wrong. This guide sets out what official sources say about AI in logistics and its governance in India, works through an accuracy example with made-up numbers to show why human review stays necessary, and ends with questions to put to a provider. It makes no claim about how widely any tool is used.
For the tools in more detail, see our guides to AI in freight forwarding automation and AI demand forecasting in transportation logistics.
What Official Sources Say
UNCTAD's Review of Maritime Transport 2025 says that artificial intelligence systems predict congestion before it happens, that using artificial intelligence and blockchain for port management has supported greater transparency and real-time encrypted data exchange, and that each digital advance creates new vulnerabilities, with cyberattacks on shipping on the rise. It also says that developing countries, particularly the least developed, lag in accessing and applying AI-powered technology and that less than a third of developing countries have AI strategies.
In India, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology unveiled the India AI Governance Guidelines on 5 November 2025. A PIB release says the framework has four components: seven guiding principles, key recommendations across six pillars of AI governance, an action plan with short, medium and long-term timelines and practical guidelines for industry, developers and regulators. It quotes the Secretary of MeitY as saying the focus remains on using existing legislation wherever possible and the Principal Scientific Adviser as describing "Do No Harm" as the guiding principle. For a business, the practical reading is that existing laws, such as the data protection and customs laws below, still apply when a tool is involved.
Where AI Can Help an Importer
| Task | What the tool does | What a person should still check |
|---|---|---|
| Document checking | Reads invoices, packing lists and transport documents and flags mismatches | The flagged items and, as the example shows, the items it did not flag |
| Arrival and congestion prediction | Estimates arrival times and port delays from past data | Whether the estimate has been right on your lanes |
| Demand forecasting | Predicts what to order and when | The assumptions, and special events the data may not contain |
| Routine questions | Answers status and document queries | Anything that involves money, law or exceptions |
| Exception spotting | Flags late milestones and unusual patterns | Whether the alert needs action |
Our guides to generative AI for logistics paperwork and AI chatbots for logistics customer service cover two of these in detail.
A Made-Up Accuracy Example
Suppose a forwarder uses a tool to check 1,000 documents a month, and that 3% of them, or 30 documents, contain a real mismatch. Suppose the tool catches 90% of real mismatches and wrongly flags 4% of clean documents. All numbers are made up.
| Step | Calculation | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Real mismatches caught | 30 x 0.90 | 27 |
| Real mismatches missed | 30 minus 27 | 3 |
| Clean documents | 1,000 minus 30 | 970 |
| False alarms | 970 x 0.04 | 38.8 |
| Total alerts | 27 + 38.8 | 65.8 |
| Share of alerts that are real | 27 divided by 65.8 | 41% |
Three lessons follow. First, the tool still misses 3 real mismatches a month, so a person has to remain responsible for the final check. Second, more than half of the alerts are false alarms, so staff must be able to clear them quickly or they will start to ignore alerts. Third, the figures depend on how often real mismatches occur and where the alert threshold is set, so ask a provider for its own measured results on documents like yours.
Customs Responsibility Cannot Be Delegated to Software
Under Section 46(4A) of the Customs Act, 1962, the importer who presents a bill of entry must ensure the accuracy and completeness of the information given, the authenticity and validity of supporting documents and compliance with any restriction or prohibition relating to the goods. Section 111(m) makes goods that do not correspond in value or any other particular with the entry liable to confiscation, and Section 114AA provides a penalty of up to five times the value of the goods for knowingly or intentionally making, signing or using a false or incorrect declaration, statement or document. Section 146 says no person shall carry on business as a customs broker at a customs station without a licence. An AI tool does not hold such a licence and does not take over the importer's duty, so a person must review any declaration that a tool has prepared. The text we read is CBIC's consolidated version of 30 March 2022, so confirm the current wording with your customs broker.
Data Protection Applies Too
The Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 makes a data fiduciary responsible for complying with the Act in respect of any processing undertaken by it or on its behalf by a data processor, and requires it to protect personal data by taking reasonable security safeguards to prevent a personal data breach (Section 8). The Act's schedule sets a penalty of up to two hundred and fifty crore rupees for breach of the safeguards duty. A PIB release of 14 November 2025 says the DPDP Rules, 2025 were notified with an 18-month phased compliance timeline, so confirm with your adviser which duties apply from which date. Documents processed by an AI tool contain names and contact details of individuals, so ask where the data are stored, who can see them and whether they are used to train other systems.
Reading an Accuracy Claim
A proposal that says a tool is "95% accurate" leaves out what matters. Ask which measure that is, on which documents and over what period. In the example, a tool that catches 90% of real mismatches still produces alerts of which only 41% are real, so a single headline figure can describe a tool that is useful or one that wastes a clerk's day.
Time is the other side of the calculation. Suppose, with made-up figures, that clearing one alert takes 3 minutes and checking one document by hand takes 2 minutes. The 65.8 alerts take 197.4 minutes, about 3 hours 17 minutes, while checking all 1,000 documents by hand takes 2,000 minutes, about 33 hours 20 minutes. The saving is real, and so is the risk of the 3 missed mismatches. Decide whether that is acceptable by looking at what one missed mismatch would cost you, then ask the provider how a person checks a sample of the documents the tool passed.
Questions to Ask a Provider
- Which tasks use AI, and which are done by people?
- How is the output checked, and by whom, before it reaches Customs or you?
- What are the measured error rates on documents like mine?
- Where is my data processed and stored, and is it used for any other purpose?
- What happens when the tool is wrong? Who tells me and how fast?
- Can I see how a decision or an estimate was made?
- What security controls and breach procedures apply?
A Cautious Adoption Path
Start with a task where a mistake is cheap and visible, such as estimating arrival times or sorting routine questions. Measure results for a quarter against your own records. Keep a person in the loop for anything that touches customs, payment or contract terms. Extend the tool only when the measured results justify it, and keep a record of what it did.
Use Technology Carefully With RR Brothers and Logistics
RR Brothers and Logistics arranges sea freight and air freight from China and handles customs clearance in India. Ask us how documents are checked and we will explain who reviews them before filing.
Frequently Asked Questions
For tasks such as reading and checking documents, predicting arrival times and congestion, forecasting demand, answering routine questions and spotting exceptions. UNCTAD says AI systems predict congestion before it happens.
It can help prepare them, but Section 46(4A) of the Customs Act makes the importer who presents the bill of entry responsible for ensuring its accuracy and completeness, so a person must review the declaration.
A framework unveiled by MeitY on 5 November 2025 with seven guiding principles, recommendations across six pillars, an action plan and practical guidelines for industry, developers and regulators.
Yes where personal data are processed. The DPDP Act, 2023 makes a data fiduciary responsible for processing done on its behalf and requires reasonable security safeguards to prevent a personal data breach.
Because clean documents can far outnumber faulty ones. In the made-up example 970 of 1,000 documents were clean, so a tool that caught 90% of real mismatches and wrongly flagged 4% of clean documents produced alerts of which only 41% were real.
Start with a low-risk task, measure results against your own records for a quarter, keep a person in the loop for customs, payment and contract decisions, and extend only when results justify it.
Sources
- UNCTAD: Review of Maritime Transport 2025
- PIB: MeitY unveils India AI Governance Guidelines under IndiaAI Mission (5 November 2025)
- CBIC: Customs Act, 1962 (Sections 46, 111, 114AA and 146)
- Government of India: The Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023
- PIB: Government notifies DPDP Rules to empower citizens and protect privacy (14 November 2025)
This article is general information, not legal, tax or customs advice. Rules, rates and procedures change; confirm current requirements with the relevant authority or a licensed customs professional before you ship. Regulatory references were checked against the official sources listed above on 28 October 2026.
Image credits: header photo by Simon Kadula on Unsplash; photo by Homa Appliances on Unsplash. Used under the Unsplash License.
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